


Home is Where the Warmth Is

by MayukoMorita



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types
Genre: Kassidas if you squint, other characters make background appearances, un-beta'd
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:00:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26775508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MayukoMorita/pseuds/MayukoMorita
Summary: After thousands of years and countless lifetimes, Kassandra is allowed to rest.
Relationships: Brasidas/Kassandra (Assassin's Creed)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 46





	Home is Where the Warmth Is

She opened her eyes to nothingness.

That was the first thing that struck Kassandra—the utter and complete unencumberance. The lightness, the profound absence of everything, extended far beyond her. She turned in her place, trying to survey this curious void, and found nothing. She even doubted her footfalls when she found that they made no sound.

_Ah, yes. I died._

She died. _She died._ After so long, she died.

Suddenly, it all came back. Atlantis. The Staff of Hermes. The Heir—Layla Hassan. It was her whom Aletheia spoke of thousands of years ago. Kassandra believed this, and thus entrusted her with the Staff. Had that been wise? Had that been the right choice? Kassandra had hinged everything on a silent agreement. On a look in Layla’s eyes that she had wanted to trust.

_Ah, it doesn’t matter now._

For now, there was only nothing.

Kassandra walked, for there was nothing else to do. She walked, and walked, and walked, and did not run out of void to walk on. She felt no exhaustion, not even the hint of fatigue. If she stopped, it was only to gather her bearings. A pointless exercise, since there was never any change in the emptiness.

_So this is death._

She thought of Phoibe, and wondered if death is the same for everyone. Is the afterlife the same for a millennia-old wanderer and a bright inquisitive child? Does this even qualify as an afterlife? It would have been quite the disappointment for feisty Phoibe. To have been so daring and brave in life and in death, only to spend the following eternity walking.

Would the same void have greeted Myrinne? Barnabas? Brasidas?

_I at least hope Phoibe wasn’t alone_.

Kassandra kept walking. And thinking.

_If people knew dying was this boring, nobody would be afraid of it_.

When Kassandra had finished her litany of all the people she loved (hoping, for each of them, a more eventful afterlife than hers at every invocation), she began to sing. She sang her _mater’s_ lullabies. The drinking songs she learned growing up in Kephallonia. The sea shanties Barnabas loved. With every melody she fancied the void growing a little warmer. She remembered _mater_ humming as they skinned the rabbits they caught during training. She remembered herself singing the same songs to Alexios in turn. Admonishing Phoibe who would sing bawdy songs out loud. Watching Roxana’s wine-flushed face as she sang along with the crew. Brasidas’s hearty laugh at his drunk singing men.

She hardly noticed the emptiness give way to hard packed earth and sunlight.

Like soot being washed off by the rain, the nothingness around her fell away. Kassandra kept her step, fearing whatever was happening would stop if she did. She watched a world appear before her. Or was it always there, obscured by the fog of loneliness? Summoned only by the memories of her life?

Slowly, the din of silence also gave way to sounds. Kassandra followed the path that revealed itself with every step she took. She followed it through the receding emptiness until the sounds began to be _familiar._

Wood hitting wood. Then wood hitting flesh. Then flesh hitting earth.

“Up,” Nikolaos commanded.

“Yes, _pater_.”

She watched the scene from her childhood unfold like a dream—foreign yet familiar, intimate yet distant, real yet strange. A memory made flesh. The father she knew tall and proud, towering over her not ungently; the reproach in his voice never reaching his eyes. Her mother vibrant and distinct, graceful and dignified; her teasing laughter colored with all the love in the world. Her soft little brother safe in her mother’s arms.

“Hurry and finish this before the lamb gets cold,” Myrrine called.

Kassandra dared to go closer as she watched her younger self stand in silent acknowledgement of both parents’ commands.

“Or we can just eat Baby Alexios,” _pater_ taunted as he pretended to snatch the baby from _mater_. A bit they never tired of playing.

“No!” Little Kassandra said. “He’s my brother!” She laughed as she held on to _pater’s_ waist.

It was surreal to watch her own life from the outside. She felt like a voyeur, spying on a self from ages ago. She might as well be a stranger. But it also felt like a home. A familiar memory in the middle of this barren afterlife.

She was rooted to where she stood, but Kassandra followed the motions she knew like clockwork; thousand-year old memories returning to her, surfacing like dreams.

“What about you?”

This was not part of the memory. Kassandra did not recall talking to a familiar stranger in her youth. Yet here her little reflection was addressing her, looking her in the eye.

“What about me?” Kassandra approached the shade cautiously. The crunch of her sandals on the packed earth serving little comfort.

“We’ve been waiting for you,” Little Kassandra replied.

The weary _misthios_ knelt before her younger reflection. “We?” She reached out, hoping to find an anchor along with the answer.

It was Phoibe’s cheek that caught her hand.

“Yes, Kassandra. We. All of us!”

Before Kassandra could understand what had happened, she was already scrambling to her feet, being led away by the solid warmth of Phoibe’s hand.

“You took so long, we were starting to worry we’d never see you again,” Phoibe said. Her hold on Kassandra was sure and strong, as if eternal rest had granted her small body the strength she never managed to grow into in life.

Kassandra found herself panting, short of breath. Not for the soft jog she found herself being dragged along, but for the exhilaration and confusion caused by everything that was happening. The rush of joy and excitement pounded in her phantom chest. So many thoughts, memories, and words scrambled for attention through her lips, only for apprehension and wariness to bar them exit. The lump forming in her throat did little to ease the heart that suddenly made its presence known again.

“I…,” she managed between breaths, “I’m sorry. There were many things I had to take care of.”

Around her, the shade of her old home, of Sparta gave way to the bright void once again. But this time it felt warmer, less empty.

“I know,” Phoibe said, not a step missing in her voice, “but you’re home now.”

Home. After millennia, home. It was only right that it was little Phoibe bringing her home. Kassandra knew she would let Phoibe take her anywhere. They had turned a hovel into a home together. And just by her presence, this mysterious void had lost all its coldness, and began to envelop Kassandra like an embrace. But still, she had to ask.

“Where is home?”

The emptiness was vast, seemingly endless. But Phoibe navigated it as flawlessly as she did the streets of Athens. When she came to a halt, she did so with the finality of destination. She turned to Kassandra, and for a moment the _misthios_ feared Phoibe’s shade would disappear, too. She couldn’t bear going back to the cold void. To lose Phoibe again would be too painful. But Kassandra’s little friend stayed where she stood, and on her face was a curious expression. She looked at Kassandra like someone who thought the answer was obvious, like the question was unnecessary.

“Here with us, of course.”

Like an incantation, Phoibe’s words invoked the emptiness to change. Kassandra once again stood on firm earth. She took in the scent of trees once more. The sun beat down on her face again. A familiar shadow swooped overhead, momentarily breaking the sun’s glare.

Kassandra watched Ikaros fly over her, as he had always done lifetimes ago. But he did not perch on her shoulder. Instead, as Kassandra followed the flight of her once avian companion with her eyes, he landed on the shoulders of someone familiar.

Missed. Longed for. Ached for. Thousands of years regretted for.

Ikaros, Kassandra’s best friend, perched on Brasidas’s waiting shoulder.

Brasidas. General. Confidant. Trusted ally. And a million other things Kassandra would never allow herself to express or feel. Until now.

“Welcome home, Kassandra.” His voice coursed through Kassandra like warm honey. The thousands of years that separated them seemed imagined.

She let out a breath that sounded like his name. A name she spent lifetimes hearing, but never had the courage to speak herself. The world, cruelly and mercifully, never forgot him, and so never did she. And there he stood in front of her. She had seen his likeness a thousand times over across the ages, and never found them satisfactory. Seeing him now, she realized. How can any likeness ever capture the fire in his eyes? The fire that blazed in the heat of battle, and the fire that warmed her like only a hearth could.

The space between them grew smaller, though she hardly felt her feet move. And in an instant, Kassandra was lost in him. In a moment, she was lost in an embrace that cursed the time and distance.

“I’m home,” she breathed to Brasidas’ shoulder.

“You are,” he whispered back.

Before she could pull away to look at him, Phoibe had flung herself to their waists and clung tightly. “Hey, leave some for the rest of us,” she admonished Brasidas.

“You’re right. I’m sorry, little Phoibe,” he replied with his gruff chuckle.

And just as Phoibe said it, every person Kassandra had ever loved made their way to where she and Brasidas were still in each other’s arms.

“I told you she liked him more than us,” Alexios boomed in his voice that always had a hint of sarcasm.

“I would, too,” Stentor replied, just as wryly.

With them, Myrrine, Nikolaos—the real ones, not the shades of her memory—Barnabas, Herodotos, everyone she promised Aletheia she would see again, enclosed Kassandra in a confusing but comforting blur of embraces and voices she thought lost in the ages, only for them to find her again.

And it struck Kassandra—overwhelmed by the weight of all she loved and all who loved her. The immensity, the profound presence of everyone, soaked deep within her. She could hardly turn in her place, wrapped in sensations she thought forgotten, and found that she did not want to move. As she was surrounded by her people, the noise of the ages and the ages of noise made no sound.

She closed her eyes to the warmth of home.


End file.
